Team 701 Testing Intake to Shooter Ball Transfer

[Valkonn]

What kind of tubing is that? The orange one.

[Mike Marandola]

Originally Posted by Valkonn

What kind of tubing is that? The orange one.

Urethane belting. It's very popular for game piece conveyors. A good example is 973 in 2009:

[Valkonn]

Both 973 and you used the orange one, which appears to only come in solid. Is there any reason to use the solid one over the hollow tubing?

[Ty Tremblay]

Originally Posted by Valkonn

Both 973 and you used the orange one, which appears to only come in solid. Is there any reason to use the solid one over the hollow tubing?

I find solid easier to weld. With the use cases it's going to see in FRC, hollow is plenty strong enough.

[Orion1]

if you don't mind me asking, what are the small green wheels on the roller gripper made of?

[asid61]

Very nice! I will be looking forward to seeing how you arc the ball/ adjust angle for shots.

[bEdhEd]

Originally Posted by asid61

Very nice! I will be looking forward to seeing how you arc the ball/ adjust angle for shots.

We had a very successful test yesterday with our pneumatic actuating system. Worked as expected on the first try! Now, it's a matter of tuning our angle and seeing if we could go for some smaller cylinders. With the angle and arc we hope to have, I predict that we may be able to shoot over any defenders that meet our front bumpers. The reason I predict this is because our 2012 robot Odin could shoot over our 2011 robot Valkyrie when bumper to bumper.

You can see that here. The great thing about this game is the height limit is much lower, and Valkyrie is much taller than any robot in this game (at least before the end game). It's important, however, to consider Odin's shooter shot from the middle of the robot frame, where our 2016 robot will shoot from right behind the bumper. So the tradeoff this year is closer-to-bumper shooter with smaller defense robots vs. middle of frame shooter with taller defense robots. We'll just have to see.

[MichaelBick]

Originally Posted by bEdhEd

You can see that here. The great thing about this game is the height limit is much lower, and Valkyrie is much taller than any robot in this game (at least before the end game). It's important, however, to consider Odin's shooter shot from the middle of the robot frame, where our 2016 robot will shoot from right behind the bumper. So the tradeoff this year is closer-to-bumper shooter with smaller defense robots vs. middle of frame shooter with taller defense robots. We'll just have to see.

There are a couple more variables involved. Some teams are thinking of shooting from further away with flatter trajectories. Those teams will be very block-able by a full height team using their 15" extension to block.

[bEdhEd]

Originally Posted by MichaelBick

There are a couple more variables involved. Some teams are thinking of shooting from further away with flatter trajectories. Those teams will be very block-able by a full height team using their 15" extension to block.

I was referring to my own team only. We definitely have a similar arc to Odin's shots if you look at the first thread I started in the Robot Showcase forum of our shooting tests from the outer works. As for the teams who plan to have straight shots from the outer works, I agree that they may have trouble with a blocker, provided that their shooter height is low enough to the floor, which may depend most on the height of the robot. This is assuming a taller robot will shoot from the very top of their superstructure as opposed to the middle or bottom, and such a height and angle must be determined by a straight shooter.

Cheesecake, anyone?

[Tom Line]

Originally Posted by Orion1

if you don't mind me asking, what are the small green wheels on the roller gripper made of?

Banebot wheels.

http://www.banebots.com/category/T40P-2875.html

[Libby K]

Originally Posted by Ty Tremblay

I find solid easier to weld. With the use cases it's going to see in FRC, hollow is plenty strong enough.

We tend to use the aluminum connectors for the hollow (instead of welding) and it's worked like a charm for us.

The trick with hollow & the connectors is to 1) get a straight cut on the tube for both ends, and 2) not to reuse an end once you've pulled the connector out. Snip it a little bit so the scratched-up part is gone, and you've got a really solid belt even when re-using the connector.